What is AirTight Management?

AirTight Management is the first ever comprehensive framework for all the management systems a small to medium size business (“SMB” from 15 to 999 employees) needs to run and grow their company. The AirTight Six Systems move a company from “seat of the pants” entrepreneurship to professional management best practices. They allow scaling and market share dominating performance. Using these Systems properly will likely make your company a market leader within a few years because so few companies do even a few of these six things well. Doing them all well will put you in the top 5% of companies in the world.

Each of the AirTight Six Systems can be installed individually, or in any combination based on your timeframe, needs and budget. Your specific situation will determine the order we recommend to implement each System for greatest impact.

AirTight incorporates hundreds of the best and timeless ideas and practices from the top management gurus of the last 75 years distilled into a single trainable framework. These ideas and practices have been extracted from hundreds of the best business books of all time from authors like:Peter Drucker, Jim Collins, Michael Porter, Geoffrey Moore, Clayton Christensen, Tom Peters, Jack Welch and over a hundred others. This distillation of best practices used well will make your company a world-class leader in its field....

A good Strategic Planning System also includes a “cadence” and processes to improve communications to all levels in the organization on key priorities and integrate that plan into operations. This increases productivity and morale and reduces waste, stress and friction.

Strategic Planning empowers managers to lead, not depend on the C-Level for every decision, growing their abilities, job fulfillment and creating a winning psychology to empower employees.

Strategic Plans creates higher “differentiation” which drives better profitability, lower selling and marketing costs and a niche focus to be the best, a leader not follower, in a market....

Benefits of AirTight Management Best Practices System #2

PAMS is short for “Performance, Accountability and Merit System”. PAMS creates a high-performance culture by using hundreds of proven best practices in management and leadership. We call this culture a “Darwinian Meritocracy” because it evolves and adjusts based on all situational factors internally and externally.

PAMS incorporates hundreds of the best ideas and proven management techniques from hundreds of books and management gurus of the last 75+ years to create high-performance team and superior results so you don’t have to “reinvent the wheel” or read 300+ books like our founder did to develop AirTight Management.

PAMS includes training in the five styles of management every professional manager needs to know and use to maximize productivity, results and each employee’s individual performance. Executive coaching can also accelerate manager development with high ROI when appropriate.

Just one of the subsystems we teach has been proven by research to increase corporate value creation by 56% compounded annually on average!

PAMS provides a development career path for your best employees, reduces politics, increases trust and focus to drive more revenue and net profit....

Benefits of AirTight Dashboards & Metrics- System #3

Dashboards allow a business to be “run by the numbers” freeing up management to work “on”, not “in” the business. Simple monthly reviews will drive key strategic decisions easily.

Dashboards allow many day-to-day activities and processes to mature and be put on “auto-pilot” so employees and managers are accountable to perform and also to improve.

Good dashboards drive Constant and Never Ending Improvement (CANI), or Kaizen, for key processes and metrics to increase quality, reduce costs and increase market share.

A well designed department dashboard can transform a mediocre manager into a good to excellent manager by creating focus, accountability and making subtle issues far more visible to all involved so corrections can be made that often linger unnoticed for years. Dashboards also allow quicker and less disruptive transitions when people leave.

Dashboards provide early warning indications of both industry (external) and company (internal) trends that might go undetected until it is too late to adjust....

Benefits of AirTight Strategic Budgeting - System #4

AirTight Strategic Budgeting develops better allocation of resources to optimize Return on Investment (ROI) based on opportunities and innovation. It is not just a cost control system/method, like most accounting departments will implement, but a strategic process that is linked directly into a Strategic Plan.

Includes all the tools needed to implement a monthly financial review process that holds everyone accountable and makes managers treat their area of the business as their own to “own results” not just activities.

Fund small projects with frugal experimentation to increase innovation then scale those that work.

Dovetail monthly and quarterly financial results with Strategic Planning goals for long-term tracking and projection and a feedback loop to improve....

We help install standard Management Systems in weeks that would normally take years for companies to evolve themselves.

Virtually every problem in any business traces back to the absence of one of Six Systems. Jim Collins in the classic book Good to Great says these systems take five to ten years to develop, even in great companies. Most businesses never develop them at all. We have developed six generic systems that can be customized for any company in weeks. These systems incorporate hundreds of proven best practices.

We are experts at finding the root causes of business problems. Often symptoms are two or more levels away from those problems and it is difficult to understand the root cause. The problem you see is almost always just a long-term effect of a missing System. We can find and plug the holes and improve performance in every area of your business. Call (508) 381-8013 for a free evaluation.

How to Spot a Good Business Mentor

Or Coach

And other advice on Coaches versus Mentors versus Consultants

According to a MarketData Report in 2007, an estimated 40,000 people in the US, work as business or life coaches, and the $2.4 billion industry is growing at rate of 18% per year. According to the National Post, business coaching is one of the fastest growing service industries in the world.

Preface by Bob Norton: I found this article and thought it useful to people looking for a mentor or coach. A major issue I often see with this is coaches and mentors do not have the correct background for the problems at hand. Some have absolutely zero business experience and claim to be business coaches. Some are "Life Coaches" yet have not been very successful in life themselves. Other claim to be strategy experts, or other specialist, but have no real-world track record of success in that area. They are "certified" with paid classes from others who have little real experience, just coaching. A good coach is someone who has done the things they are coaching for a decade or more. Would you hire a football or tennis coach that never played football or tennis? Would not a person who was first a star at that sport make a better coach? Sure they also need the skills to teach and some framework or process but that is simple really.

So why do we have "Certified Coaches" that claim to be experts who have never been entrepreneurs, business people or even managers? This is not just silly but ridiculous. I have been to the coaching conventions and what I see is a lot of lost people who cannot keep a job looking to be independent. Often they have failed at other businesses.

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Believe it or not, entrepreneurs do not have an answer for everything. In fact, entrepreneurs can be a little messed up sometimes, and need some kind of support, or at least a listening ear. The value of mentors is often overlooked in much of the support and guidance entrepreneurs receive. But it’s there. And it’s of real value. In this post we will look at some of the key qualities of good mentors, and how to spot a good business mentor.

Good mentors have to be real

No, we don’t mean as in flesh and blood. We’re talking about people who have made a success of themselves as an entrepreneur recently, and ideally someone who is living the life now. The reason for this is that they won’t hold back on the advice they give. While some of it may be painful, you can’t argue with clear experience. If you are standing in front of someone who is proof that what they are talking about actually works, it makes it all the more easier to follow through yourself. You know someone who has done it, and they are helping you.

Good mentors have the time

Note from Bob Norton - I tend not to agree with this point, as successful people develop staff and systems to run their business so they can move on and do what they most enjoy and are best at doing. I allocate about 25% of my time to coaching and mentoring to stay connected to the marketplace and because I enjoy the work and helping other grow from my own experience. Even though this work might pay only 25% as much as other work I could be doing I think it is important work and give my experience more leverage through others. Ideally I will get some stock in a startup company with an agressive discount for new companies to get them over the Catch-22 of not having enough cash and needing lots of help. Success is doing things the way you want to for an enjoyable life and work schedule. The fact that your time is 100% filled all the time could mean the opposite too.

This is one of those funny paradoxes that plague the business world. If a mentor is to have enough time for you, this suggests (rightly or wrongly) that they are not that successful. Being successful usually means a lot of hard work, so in order for you to gauge whether or not your mentor is a good choice, get to know them first. If they seem patient and calm and still successful, they are probably a good fit for your needs.

The very best mentors are clear, to the point of being sharp

These people are successful, right? And truly successful people don’t waste time. Instead, they get to the point, sometimes appearing a little gruff along the way. If you find yourself close to starting a mentor relationship with someone who appears even a little bit fluffy or vague on anything, you may want to think twice. The best mentors are clear and direct. They have created successful lives for themselves, and this has meant potentially aggressive demeanours. Be ready for this, and welcome it. The last thing you need is a mentor who isn’t used to getting results. If some of this rubs off on you (without you being cruel to others) it can only be a positive thing.

So there are a few characteristics of good business mentors. If you’re in the market for one, go over them and see if any of them are a good fit. Having a mentor is a useful and very positive thing, especially as you become more successful. But choosing the right one is vital.

BYPILAR NALWIMBA

Do not hire a “Business Coach” that has never run a real business, and by that I mean someone who has sold more than their time. A service business just selling your time is not a business really, it is a job or freelancing. This is relatively easy. Running a multi-disciplinary business with Sales, Marketing, Operations (customer service), Finance and Product Development functions for 5, 10 or even 15+ years developed real skills. In fact this is an art that takes a decade to master. Do not hire an “Entrepreneurship Coach” who has not started a successful company. Do not hire an “Executive Coach” who has not had a long career in business with a minimum of five years as an executive in the same size company you are in because the styles, techniques and skills vary enormously between startup, small, medium and large businesses.

A good coach or mentor has also developed tools, models, systems and processes to help you. They will not walk you through details but give you guidance and leverage from their time. I have developed literally thousands of slides, models and processes since 2002 and even developed over 150 videos on key topics for my coaching clients so that a single hour with me can be like three to five hours with another coach. Call or click here to set up a free evaluation session.

The focus of a coach helping a CEO, Executive or entrerpenur to grow is dependent on many factors. This slide show is just one dimension of what must be considered for CEOs, founders and entrerpeneurs as a company grows from startup to only about fifty employees.

A Consultant is someone with vast experience to diagnose a problems, which the client does not understand, or they would not have the problem. Clients usually see and try to fix a symptom, not the root cause. A contractor is someone with specific skills who just brings more manpower to the job where the client understands the problem and skill sets hired and how to manage them.

A Coach is a guide with vast experience who does not do the actual work, but teaches the client to do that work with a "teach to fish" approach. There are dozens of methods to coach clients and a good coach will have many in their tool box for different circumstances. These include: Socratic Method,

Wikipedia's Definition of Coaching: Coaching is a training or development process via which an individual is supported while achieving a specific personal or professional competence result or goal. The individual receiving coaching may be referred to as coachee. Occasionally, the term coaching may be applied to an informal relationship between two individuals where one has greater experience and expertise than the other and offers advice and guidance as the other goes through a learning process, but coaching differs from mentoring by focusing upon competence specifics, as opposed to general overall development.

Business coaching (also from Wikipedia)

Business coaching is a type of personal or human resource development. It provides positive support, feedback and advice to an individual or group basis to improve their personal effectiveness in the business setting. Business coaching includes executive coaching, corporate coaching and leadership coaching.

The Professional Business Coach Alliance, The International Coach Federation, the International Coaching Council and the Worldwide Association of Business Coaches provide a membership-based association for business coaching professionals. These and other organizations train professionals to offer business coaching to business owners. However, there is no certification required to be a business or executive coach, and membership in such self-designed organizations is entirely optional. Further, standards and methods of training coaches can vary widely from organization to organization, reiterating the open-ended nature of business coaching. Many business coaches refer to themselves as Consultants, a broader business relationship than one which exclusively involves coaching.

There are almost as many different ways of delivering business coaching as there are business coaches. Some offer personal support and feedback, others combine a coaching approach with practical and structured business planning and bring a disciplined accountability to the relationship. Particularly in the small business market, business coaching is as much about driving profit as it is about developing the person.

Coaching is not a practice restricted to external experts or providers. Many organizations expect their senior leaders and middle managers to coach their team members to reach higher levels of performance, increased job satisfaction, personal growth, and career development. Business coaching is not the same as mentoring. Mentoring involves a developmental relationship between a more experienced "mentor" and a less experienced partner, and typically involves sharing of advice. A business coach can act as a mentor given that he or she has adequate expertise and experience. However, mentorship is not a form of business coaching.

We train and certify coaches in our Six AirTight Systems. They must have no less than five years management experience and about five years coaching or consulting to be admitted to the program because we walk our talk and believe coaching and consulting requires vast experience. Technical consultants with deep experience in very narrow areas, like a computer language, have blurred the line of what a "Consultant" is really. A top consultant needs to understand Organizational Behavior, Change Management, Process Management, Management Best Practices and Leradership at a minimum. A good consultant can change an entire organization, a bad one can help accelerate problems while eating resources.